Obama-- That Gun Grabber

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Aldo Moro before he was murdered

People who were happy that so many gun nuts shot each other at gun nut shows on Gun Appreciation Day Saturday are just meanies. Digby outlined a far better object for liberal Schadenfreude-- the self-inflicted and debilitating psychosis of the Republican base currently manifesting itself as a delusional right wing tenet of belief that the massacre at Sandy Hook never happened and that all those children are still alive and the grieving parents are actors hired by gun-grabber Obama. Are you wondering why no sincere person with a 3-digit IQ takes the Republican Party seriously any longer?

The leading version of the "Sandy Hook Hoax" theory, such as it is, holds that the incident was staged by the White House as a prelude to disarming America. Many of its claims are rooted in contradictory and confusing media statements that came out of the chaos of the first hours of the shooting, and which are virtually always present in such chaotic moments. (Similar confused media reporting served as the basis of the 9/11 Truth movement.)

Over 11 million people have already watched this video pushing the right-wing Sandy Hook Hoax conspiracy. I can't wait for someone to ask Michele Bachmann, Steve King, Steve Stockman, Paul Broun, Trey Radel, Louie Gohmert, Mike Coffman, Lynn Westmoreland, Tim Huelskamp, Phil Gingrey and Virginia Foxx about it! Would anyone in the House Crackpot Caucus dare publicly cast aspersions on such an article of Republican faith, exactly what they use to replace science and reality with as part of their collective world view?

Did someone say "reality?" This is reality: since 1968 more Americans have died from gunfire than died in all the wars of this country's history. And that's not a conspiracy theory or any kind of theory.

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Who remembers Aldo Moro. He was twice the Prime Minister of Italy and in 1978 he was kidnapped and then murdered by the Red Brigades-- yes, there was once a militant, violent, armed, revolutionary movement. Back then the NRA was a big proponent of gun control and background checks and, especially of keeping weapons out of the hands of radicals (and particularly African American radicals). Anyway, last Monday Prospero Gallinari, the brigatista convicted-- probably wrongly-- of assassinating Moro, had a heart attack and died. During the desperate hunt for Moro-- the Red Brigades held him for 2 months before shooting him-- some in the security apparatus suggested torturing a brigatista they had in custody. The general in charge said "Italy can survive the loss of Aldo Moro. It would not survive the introduction of torture." Those crazy Italians, right? Although it wasn't an Italian general who said "Should any American soldier be so base and infamous as to injure any [prisoner]... I do most earnestly enjoin you to bring him to such severe and exemplary punishment as the enormity of the crime may require. Should it extend to death itself, it will not be disproportional to its guilt at such a time and in such a cause… for by such conduct they bring shame, disgrace and ruin to themselves and their country.” That was General George Washington (September 14, 1775) beginning an American military tradition that we do not torture, a tradition ended by George W. Bush. Sorry for the tangent. Let's get back to the main point here: Rush Limbaugh, Rep. John Lewis and the NRA.

Over a decade before the Red Brigades kidnapped and murdered Aldo Moro, Martin Luther King, Jr. was leading a movement of nonviolence to complete the freeing of African American slaves in the Deep South. John Lewis was one of his disciples and was severely beaten by uniformed, state-sanctioned Alabama fascists. The other day Rush Limbaugh implied Lewis should have had a gun. "If a lot of African-Americans back in the '60s had guns and the legal right to use them for self-defense, you think they would have needed Selma?... If John Lewis, who says he was beat upside the head, if John Lewis had had a gun, would he have been beat upside the head on the bridge?"

Rep. Lewis, who many people consider the conscience of the Congress doesn't agree with Limbaugh's vision. This is the press release his office sent out after Limbaugh's show:

In an effort to encourage people to resist new gun control legislation, a statement was made on The Rush Limbaugh Show today which misrepresents Civil Rights Movement history. In the shadow of the Martin Luther King Jr. Day of Service, in the year we celebrate the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington in August, and a little more than a month before the annual celebration of the events in Selma, Rep. John Lewis was glad to address this inaccuracy.

"Our goal in the Civil Rights Movement was not to injure or destroy but to build a sense of community, to reconcile people to the true oneness of all humanity," said Rep. John Lewis. "African Americans in the 60s could have chosen to arm themselves, but we made a conscious decision not to. We were convinced that peace could not be achieved through violence. Violence begets violence, and we believed the only way to achieve peaceful ends was through peaceful means. We took a stand against an unjust system, and we decided to use this faith as our shield and the power of compassion as our defense.

"And that is why this nation celebrates the genius and the elegance of Martin Luther King Jr.'s work and philosophy. Through the power of non-violent action, Dr. King accomplished something that no movement, no action of government, no war, no legislation, or strategy of politics had ever achieved in this nation's history. It was non-violence that not only brought an end to legalized segregation and racial discrimination, but Dr. King's peaceful work changed the hearts of millions of Americans who stood up for justice and rejected the injury of violence forever."

WHAT HAPPENED IN SELMA ALABAMA?

On March 7, 1965, 600 peaceful nonviolent Civil Rights workers attempted to march from Selma to Montgomery to demonstrate the need for voting rights in Alabama. The march was led by John Lewis and Hosea Williams. They were met on the Edmund Pettus Bridge by Alabama state troopers who beat the unarmed marchers. Lewis suffered a concussion on the bridge. A few days after the march President Lyndon Johnson introduced a bill to the Congress which became the Voting Rights Act of 1965, described as one of the most effective pieces of legislation Congress has issued in the past 50 years. An important section of the Voting Rights Act is currently in jeopardy and will be reviewed by the U.S. Supreme Court in February.

David Frum, like Limbaugh a conservative Republican but, unlike Limbaugh, not a racist, mused aloud that "Lewis resisted the temptation to add the question: 'I wonder what Rush Limbaugh would say about a black protester who actually did fire upon state troopers and sheriff's deputies?'" Yes, that was when extreme right-wingers and the NRA was very much in favor of gun control. It was before the NRA became a lobbying group for weapons manufacturers.

Labels: civil rights, conspiracy theories, George Washington, gun control, Italy, John Lewis, Limbaugh, NRA, torture